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Radio Free Flood!

last.fmWe're happy to introduce Flood Radio, a service of last.fm that lets us share the sounds of some of our favorite performers from Last.fm, the past and present, people the Floodsters like to listen to, from classic old jazz and jugband to old-time and country artists, from 1960s folkies to the new breed of blues singers.

Even The Flood itself sometimes pops up on Flood Radio, but mainly it's a space to share with our friends and our heroes. Just click the Play button below to start listening like a Floodster!

Of course, with the Flood -- West Virginia's most ECLECTIC string band, after all -- it's a pretty diverse group of artists. The favorite performers group has to start with great string bands and jug bands, both old and new, from the 1920s and 1930s stars like the Memphis Jug Band, Tampa Red and Georgia Tom and Gus Cannon's Jug Stompers, Riley Puckett and the Skillet Lickers, and, of course, Charlie Poole to 1960s Jim Kweskin, the Even Dozen Jug Band, the New Lost City Ramblers to today's Juggernaut Jug Band and the Old Crow Medicine Show.

But naturally it can't stop there. The favorites also have to include blues singers like Bessie Smith, Ma Rainey, Muddy Waters, Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee and Mississippi John Hurt up to Keb Mo' and Guy Davis, and classic bluegrassers from Flatt & Scruggs to the Stanley Brothers and the Coon Creek Girls, rock greats like Little Richard, Chuck Berry and Carl Perkins, folk singers like Tom Rush, Dave Von Ronk and Ian and Sylvia, songwriters from Hazel Dickens to John Prine and Steve Goodman to Hoagy Carmichael and Fats Waller. Then throw in a little Doc Watson, Staple Singers, Fats Domino, Lefty Frizzell, Louis Armstrong.

heinekenAnd of course, we'd have to give some air time to our buddies -- Rob McNurlin, John Lilly, Jazzou Jones, Cathy Barton and Dave Para, J.P. Fraley, Andy Cohen, Pat Surface and others.

It's made possible by last.fm, a UK-based Internet radio and music community website that now claims more than 21 million active users based in more than 200 countries. Just last year, the whole shootin' match was bought by CBS Interactive for about $280 million.

Using last.fm technology, The Flood created a custom radio station that plays the music of more than a hundred artists we've added to our online library, all the ones mentioned above and many more.

Now, one note: Since last.fm is a rather cutting edge Web 2.0 application, it, well, doesn't always work right. Sometimes when we click the circled arrow, we get a message that says "no content / not enough content" or that there's been error loading the station. We've found, though, that if you just refresh page and try again or maybe leave the Flood site, then come back in and try again, it usually works. BArtSometimes, too, the player stops after a few tunes and has be re-launched. But hey, it's all free and pretty amazing, so if it's occasionally a bit hinky, well, hey, who the heck isn't?

Enjoy!